Why Stop At Three Knut Memorials In Berlin?

Why not 40 instead?

It could have been a lot worse, though, believe it or not. This Knutmania stuff, I mean. Just imagine if he would have drowned in the Arctic instead?

Knut arrived on the scene at a moment when global warming was a growing topic, born the same year that the climate-change film “An Inconvenient Truth,” starring Al Gore, was released… Gore’s “An Inconvenient Truth” claim that polar bears were drowning in the Arctic because of melting ice packs has since been discredited.

Bis zum Ende der Ausschreibung in dieser Woche seien 40 Ideen, Skizzen Bilder und Modelle beim Verein der Freunde des Berliner Zoos eingegangen.

We’ll Import Power From Anywhere

Even from Austria, if need be. And need there be.

“Missing power lines” are the cause behind the missing energy being missed in Southern Germany these days, we are told. That’s why Austria is being asked to help big buddy Germany out with a little “emergency energy,” pretty please.

But Austrians do this gladly, I think, because they know that if those missing German power lines weren’t missing than those missing power lines would be transporting tons of wonderful wind energy from the high German north to those energy-hungry factories in the south (and beyond to Austria?) where it’s missing at the moment, the energy. Like I said. Or so the theory.

The missing German nuclear power plants that were shut off after Fukushima (that’s in Japan) aren’t being missed by anybody here, though. Forget about them. It’s not the missing German nuclear power plants. It’s the missing power lines that are missing, I mean messing everything up around here.

Die Bundesnetzagentur hatte vor langfristigen Engpässen bei der Stromversorgung gewarnt. Die Versorgungssicherheit bleibe durch den Atomausstieg für eine Reihe von Jahren angespannt.

Politically Incorrect Incorrectness (Correctness?)

As you may be aware of, if you take a critical stance toward Islam in and/or the Islamification of Germany, you are a very way bad person indeed and may even be what some here would call an intolerant and politically incorrect dirt ball.

But if you call yourself Politically Incorrect (PI) to begin with and make a big deal about thinking that way REAL LOUD then you’ve been outed for good and will eventually end up with the German Verfassungsschutz (Office for Constitutional Protection) on your tail.

That’s happening now, for no particular reason as far as I can see, other than the folks at the Verfassungsschutz suddenly have the need to think that the free-speaking Politically Correct just developed a dangerous and “disturbed relationship with the constitutional state.” That certainly took them awhile. PI has been around for years and hasn’t pulled any punches yet. Hmmm, and here I thought that free speech was as constitutional as apple PI, I mean pie, I mean Apfelkuchen.

Es gebe Anhaltspunkte dafür, dass etwa die Betreiber antimuslimischer Internetseiten “ein gestörtes Verhältnis zum demokratischen Rechtsstaat” hätten.

And The Downbeat Goes On

Yeah, Angie Merkel has a New Year’s hangover, too.

The German chancellor warns us, I mean you, that the year ahead will “undoubtedly” be harder than 2011.

Yeah, prost Neujahr to you, too, lady.

Some 22 percent of the (German poll) respondents expect the region to abandon the euro and return to national currencies while 90 percent said in response to a separate question that other euro member states would join Greece, Portugal and Ireland in needing aid.

What Do You Mean A Man Dressed As Santa Claus?

A man dressed as Santa Claus poses with his ‘helpers’ who are busy answering children’s letters in the Santa Claus post office in the Eastern German town of Himmelpfort (Heaven’s Gate) on November 10, 2011. Children can send their Christmas wish lists to Himmelpfort from around the world and receive a reply from Santa. In 2010, the post office here received 285.000 letters in 17 languages.

Merry Christmas and stuff like that.

Too Much Sun, Son

Now if we could only learn to harness the power of falling solar energy company stocks…

Solar Millennium AG plunged by a record in Frankfurt trading after becoming the second publicly traded German solar company to file for insolvency.

Let’s face it, people: The sun and Germany just don’t mix.

Solar Millennium war ein grüner Börsenstar. Beim Solarkraftwerk-Hersteller klang immer alles nach Weltrettung, ständig ging es um die Zukunft der Menschheit. Seit Donnerstag ist das Unternehmen pleite und es wird klar: Viele hundert Millionen Euro sind weg. Es droht einer der größten Anlageskandale der Geschichte. 

Damned If You Don’t

Remember long, long ago when the US messed up so awfully and needed so desperately to get out of Iraq as soon as possible (I’m talking the German view here, folks)?

Well, now the big American mistake is that they just left. Everything is falling apart again already and it’s all our fault, again already.

The Germans should know what they’re talking about here this time, though. US troops are still in their country and have been since 1945.

Kaum haben die letzten US-Truppen den Irak verlassen, brechen im Land alte Konflikte auf.

This Just In: Britain Distrusts Germany

Wow, talk about a news item.

This must be the scoop of the century. Are Woodward and Bernstein back? Did the CIA finally do something right? Where on earth do Spiegel journalists uncover such unexpected and volatile information?

Always remember, folks: If it’s not in the Spiegel, it didn’t happen.

“Welcome to the Fourth Reich”